“The Girls on the Bus” and the Wild World of Campaign Reporting

Hello Sunshine, Hey Pam.

Today on the bright Side, we're tagging along with the Girls on the Bus. Journalists and best selling author Amy Chosek is talking about the new TV series inspired by her memoir and the power of seeing women in politics on screen.

It's Wednesday, April seventeenth. I'm Danielle Robe.

And I'm Simone Boyce and this is the bright Side from Hello Sunshine.

All right, here's your morning drip. This one is for our Swifties. Taylor Swift is teaming up with Spotify to create an open air poetry library.

Interesting.

It's for the release of her upcoming album, The Tortured Poets Department, which is coming out this Friday, the nineteenth.

That is going to take over our algorithms on Friday. Yes it is.

I actually really like this. I love poetry. You know, you and I share a love for beautiful words. And I think Taylor, if anybody has the ability to make poetry quote unquote cool or bring it mainstream. The library is going to be at the Grove in La on April sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth.

But don't worry if you're not in La.

All the surprises and hints that are going to be there will also be available on her album countdown page.

All right, so we all saw that Caitlin Clark is going pro and that transition, well, it's proving that the gender pay gap is still so real, especially for female athletes. Ugh. Earlier this week, the Indiana Fever selected her first overall in the WNBA draft. But it's honestly her paycheck that's making headlines. So she signed a four year, three hundred and thirty eight thousand dollars contract, which means that she's making less than one hundred thousand dollars in her first

The challenge is the inequality here is so foundational. Yes, it's based on ticket sales, is what they say. But what makes up ticket sales Players that are stars, and what makes star players buy and from brands?

Time on TV?

Think about how many hours people in sports television and radio talk about Tom Brady versus Serena Williams, like the gap is so real there, and so it makes this whole thing very tricky.

Listen, this is a huge systemic issue. But the good news is that Caitlin stands to make additional monies through her name, image and likeness deals. She's probably going to make millions from that. So hopefully this marks a turning point for athletes like her.

I hope so, but I think it's going to take a little bit of time. I mean, this is why Brittany Griner was playing in Russia. A lot of these WNBA players have to go play overseas because they can't sustain their life on WNBA salaries. I mean, Caitlin was the number one pick and that's what she's making. Can you imagine what the two hundred and something pick is making. Like a lot of it is just not sustainable and so similar to how we talk about the pay gap in general, it just needs to be sped up.

Brands, this is on you. It is time to step up. Make sure our girl Caitlin Clark stays paid. Okay, we love to see Prada dressing her. That was such a cool moment. Let's keep it up. Okay, folks, Okay.

Also in the world of sports, photos of Nike's new women's Olympic track uniforms are going absolutely viral.

And simone it's for all the wrong reasons.

Nike recently debuted its line of uniforms for athletes, and one of the options for women's track and field immediately sparked outrage. They were these unitard bikini line sort of high wasted.

Numbers, extremely high.

Yeah.

I don't know how to explain it. They're like bikini bottoms.

If you haven't seen it, look up an image of it. But it's even more revealing than a bikini bottom. The fabric sort of arches inward, like towards the belly button, and then it like goes back out over the hip. But it's such a severe cut that I can't imagine how any athlete would be able to perform confidently and comfortably in this.

Yeah, it's it's revealing. And there is a side by side of the men's fit and it's like a full uniform onesie, and so people are just pissed.

I'm pissed.

Yeah, I can't. I don't belong anywhere near a track, and I'm pissed. I just think this is so insulting. And Nike, you could have just put the men's uniform side by side next to the women's uniform. You could have made them the exact same. There's no reason why the women have to be in this skimpy uniform.

Well, I just think about how I like to show up to work and if I'm not in an outfit that I feel comfortable in, I'm definitely not going to do my best job. And so for these athletes who have worked their entire lives to get to this moment, they're then hit with this, it just seems so unnecessary.

Okay, I hope you're thirsty, Danielle, because this next story is it's an interesting one that I've seen all over TikTok and Instagram right now, and that is adults using breast milk for their own health benefits. So we've seen bodybuilders do it. They say that it helps them gain muscle. There are lots of videos of people using breast milk and even frozen breast milk as a face treatment or

So I don't know.

I think is still a little bit cloudy, but I'm all for it, Like I why not, it's not going to hurt you, especially like with Courtney Kardashian it's her breast milk.

It was controversial, people were mad at her.

I think people have strong opinions about breast milk in general, about like sharing breast milk. Like I just saw a video where a woman's sister was feeding her baby with her own breast milk, and there are a lot of strong opinions about that. But I think if we were to look back throughout history, this probably wouldn't have been that weird. I think we have a lot of weird feelings about it. Now I have.

Zero weird feelings about it. There's tons of philanthropy programs that are all about women donating breast milk because they call it liquid gold for a reason. It has so many healing properties. So I'm into this. I'm also the type of person that would eat my own placenta. I eat like brown bananas. I have, like things in my

When I was breastfeeding my son, a friend came over and she was like, can I have a glass of breast milk? And she drank it right there on the spot.

So she's still alive.

All good, of course, it's like super juice in there Byby.

Did you have Michael try it?

I think so. Yeah, I think I made him try it.

I actually remember using a little bit of breast milk on my face when I was dealing with like post pregnancy acne, and I don't know that it actually helped, but it's like, why not, why not try it?

This story is not controversial to me. It's just breast milk. It's like it's so natural and it's amazing that some of us have the ability to make it.

Yes, I Actually I also remember using it on my kids whenever they had a cut or something, or I would put it in the bathtub with them.

It's great for skin.

I think just the fact that we're talking about this is great because I would love to see more scientific studies about the benefits of breast milk. I think there are a lot more that we probably don't even understand yet.

After the break, we're talking with political journalist and author Amy Chosick about transforming her memoir into a TV show, one that Simone and I are absolutely obsessed with. We are so excited to talk with our next guest, journalist and author Amy Chosick.

Now.

Amy covered politics at The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal for many years. She's also the author of the best selling book Chasing Hillary, which we loved so It chronicles her experience following Hillary Clinton's twenty sixteen presidential campaign.

And since then, Amy has taken on a new role as the co creator and executive producer of the MAC series The Girls on the Bus. It's loosely based on her book and follows four reporters as they cover a cadre of flawed presidential candidates on the campaign trail. Amy, We're so thrilled to have you on the bride side. Welcome to the.

Oh my god, I'm so excited to be here. Thanks guys.

Okay, Amy, we'll just dive right in. Although the Girls on the Bus is inspired by your memoir, there's no Hillary, there's no Trump in the show, which seems like a very deliberate choice, right. Why did you decide to set it in this fictional political landscape.

Well, very early on, when I first met the one of the producers, Greg Burlante, we decided it should be a fictional world, no Hillary, no Trump. Partly then it was very raw. It was like twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen. I think nobody was in the mood to relive twenty sixteen.

I definitely wasn't.

And so, yeah, and so, for one, we wanted we wanted to set it in a fictional world. We also wanted the politics to really be the backdrop, and the friendship, the female friendship that forms on the bus is kind of the real story. It's a little bit like Friday Night Lights. You don't have to like football to be

So we've been binging, Oh yeah, I love it. I'm obsessed. For me, it's like the best show I've seen in a really long time. It makes me so happy, and it made me smile. I haven't smiled watching a show in a long time like that. But you mentioned these friendships and there's four main characters, there's four main women.

Who did you.

Base these women off of? Because they are based off of real characters?

Right?

There are all.

Composites, for sure, I mean definitely.

You know, my journalistic heiro Nora Efron said everything is copy, so you know, of course I pull different things from real life, but they're all sort of composite characters. Julie Plack and I who I co created this with early on, wanted four very different types of women generationally. We wanted them to be really different types of journalists. We wanted

And Andrea Mitchell.

Andrea was on the bus with us every day, and she was so kind and mentoring, and she's just like slugging it out with us through Ohio with you know, with the rest, with the kids. She's incredible, And I think there was something very early on with these women

The young influencer.

We keep bringing up Andrea Mitchell, so I just want to share it for anybody who doesn't know. She's now seventy seven years old and she was I think one of the first, yeah, female political reporters.

She's at NBC now and just kind of legendary.

The dynamic with the influencer was so interesting to me, particularly because I've always kind of had one foot in digital one foot in traditional media, and I thought the undertones of those relationships between journalism and influencers were so well thought out and articulated.

And also can I add the commentary on the tension between old school journalism and traditional journalism and the future of it.

Where it's headed.

Yeah, I mean we always wanted an influencer on the bus, but she seemed a little like, really fictionalized when we first started.

Now I think it's very it feels very real.

It feels like this is the spot when Sadie says sponsored content the future of journalism, you know, and substack that was something like we wouldn't have even put in the script two years ago. That now feels like a ton of people are getting their political news from podcasts, influence TikTok, you know, And so yeah, Lola became even more I think realistic, and I think those debates, you know,

And I was like, oh, I'm going to give up my right to vote.

You know.

You know, I think my generation sort of started questioning that, but the younger kids are even more so, like objectivity.

What you know, I got into this to change the world.

Amy, one of the characters in the show, asked one of the best questions I've ever heard from a journalist, real or fake. She said to one of the political candidates, how are you going to break our hearts? I just love how human that question is. Was that a question you've asked before?

To be honest, I was a little embarrassed.

You know, I very much worry about what my former colleagues think, And I was like, is that like the softest question ever? And I'm like, but actually, I love that it resonated with you because that's how we feel, right, Like.

We feel so like.

I just remember when I went to Obama, was covering Obama's rallies and a million people turned out in Saint Louis, and it was like, this incredible thing, and you have this impending dread. What's going to happen? How are they going to take this guy down? Or what skeleton does this woman have in her closet? Like, I feel like we are so kind of accustomed to that now that nobody can just exist.

But isn't what you mentioned about worrying about how your colleagues would have perceived that question, whether it was too soft. That kind of gets to the disconnect between journalism today and where the audience is. Yeah, it's it's not human enough, right, It's like not getting to the humanity that people really want to see in journalists and media today.

I think, No, I love I love you that that was your conclusion because that's kind of exactly what I wanted to do. One of the big things I wanted to do with the show is like the original Boys on the Bus was really a repudiation of pack journalism. He was criticizing the way politics was covered. And I think that what we're doing with the show, in an indirect way, is imagining, you know, if we covered politics differently, would we have to politics?

You know?

And I think that's really like, that's a big question. It is.

It's not directly asked, but I think that's the question that each girl is grappling with, right, And I think it, you know, towards the end when they decide to work together, like that's a very different way of covering politics. We are all about the scoop and we're about throwing elbows and I'm going to find out which staffer was fired before you do. And it's like then you've got like voters who are wait, how's this going to impact my life?

So I think that's what we're sort of imagining with this. You really centered sisterhood in this show. And also I was so heartened by the empathy between these characters. Because they're so different, they don't have to have empathy for each other. Yeah, they're across political aisles and ideologies, and they work for these outlets that are enemies, sworn enemies. So how did your found family on the campaign trail inform the friendships that we see in the show?

It definitely did, you know.

And I think that the bus was like a great vehicle for that, right because these are women I probably normally I would have never like made friends with Andrea Mitchell a normal life, you know, not because she's not lovely, just because like, where would we even have met? And but you're forced together on a bus, right, It's almost like those early seasons.

Of the real world. You know what happens when people stop being.

Polite because you're forced together. You're all staying in the same mid range hotel rooms. Your life is not your own, you know, your your personal life is a dumpster fire because you're just giving giving it all up for the job. And I think, you know, I've seen some criticism of the show of like and what world would an influencer, It would like a progressive influencer be friends with like a conservative you know, black woman.

And I'm like in.

Our world, in the world I created, and I think that's the the whole point. Yeah, And that's the privilege of writing for television, right is we can imagine the world as we want it to be, not as it is. And I think that that's something that was, you know, both in my own life being friends with women I never would have normally met, but also just being able to imagine a world where they can see each other as humans.

This is one scene that I cannot get out of my mind. And one of the characters is having a disagreement with her daughter because she wants her mom to pay more attention to her and not be so focused on work. And the mom says, my work is the first.

Line in my obituary. You, my dear, are the.

Last oh I got Like, I had so many emotions.

It was hard to watch, honestly.

Well, I think partly because Carla is so incredible she brings such empathy to that scene, but definitely one of the look we all read the whole Writer's Room, you know, read The Boys on the Bus. This is about the men covering the nineteen seventy three McGovern campaign.

The only women in that.

Book are like waiting at home to welcome their great men home from their great job on the campaign trail, doing important work.

They've got the meat loaf in the oven.

I don't think any of those men's children were like, why the hell weren't you there for my ballet reside. I don't think any of those men had to answer for putting their jobs first, right, And so what I mean? I love the obituary line, but I also just love that Grace says I was out making the money, you know, And it's like, I don't think any man has to

It's also just honest. I worked with a lot of women like that, and I saw a lot of women like that in my field. So it's just nice to have an honest portrayal of ambitious women. Okay, Amy, there's a storyline about a female reporter navigating a tricky romantic relationship with a press secretary, and that kind of conflict adventures is something that we've seen a lot in stories about female journalists.

But I know that there's an intention behind it. So what was it? Well, I would say I don't think we've seen exactly this.

I think the trope that myself and other female journalists do not appreciate in film and TV is the female journalist is sleeping with a source to get information, like, right, she would have never gotten that scoop on her own. She had to flash her tits that sleep with the guy, Like it's always that. So it's something that was really important to me. I sit down, you know, to brainstorm this show, and my partners are like, but they're like.

She has to have sex with someone, you know, it's a TV show.

Like they kept they kept pitching people what about this this, And I was like, no, no, she could never do that. It's a complicated romantic entanglement, which is something we see in Washington all the time because as in Hollywood, it's like an incestuous one industry town and who are you gonna who.

Are you gonna meet?

Right? You know the fact that we've gotten some criticism for Sadie's choice, but I have never heard one person say that press secretary really should have told her he was still employed. Like, no one's ever criticized the male quote unquote source or press secretary. No, I've not seen one thing saying that guy he should have known. That was a conflict that was about not one. I mean, there was one article that called Sadie slut, and I was like, lady hooked up with her ex boyfriend when

You're really reading the reactions to the show and the reviews, You're taking it all in.

I really shouldn't. I'm starting to block. I'm starting to block. But what do you think drives that? Are you just curious about what people say about it or what is it? I'm just like a masochist.

I don't know.

Let's just say no, I'm curious.

I mean, you put something out in the world and you want to know how it's being received. And I think since this is the first TV project, you know, my partners are.

Like, I never read what are you doing?

I never read any of that, you know, but I think this is from I read the early ones. I'm not really reading them anymore, but yeah, I was curious.

I mean, you're also making a lot of cultural commentary on the show, so you're probably a cultural critic. You're interested in hearing what the conversation is.

Around that better than a masochist.

Thank you.

I feel I.

Feel a little enchanted by politics sometimes to this day. And you've covered several presidential campaigns and momentous first for our country. So former President Barack Obama, who was obviously the first black president, both of Hillary Clinton's campaigns to try to become the first female president.

And I'm so curious about your personal.

Experience in witnessing these historical moments. Were you enchanted by I mean, like Obama's hope Okay, it was all about hope. The country was so riled up and excited, and Hillary everyone was, regardless of her politics, excited about the possibility there were you enchanted by it?

On the bus?

Well, I love that you're still enchanted because I feel like most of the country isn't and we should be.

Right.

We should be even if it's maybe not this election, there's still the future, right, But no, I mean it's a mix, right. I had been a foreign correspondent in Japan before my editor, the Asia Bureau chief, became the Washington Bureau chief, and said, how'd you like to go to Iowa.

And cover Hillary Clinton?

So like, I hardly knew this was too thousand and seven. I hardly knew who Obama was. I had no idea what a caucus was. I'm like, America doesn't really know what a.

Caucus is either. It's fine, but we still don't buy. We still don't.

At one point I went to a Hillary rally when my first and I stood up and she said something great and everybody cheered, and I stood up and cheered, and all the press were like.

What are you doing? Sit down? We don't do that here, And so it's like going inspired.

I was inspired, And then I realized that we have to ceed our ability to be inspired as journalists, right, we have to seed our ability to get you know, so excited and wrapped up in candidates and certainly covering Obama's two thousand and eight campaign when you felt this like ground swell of enthusiasm and part of you was like, oh, that looks amazing, and I'm sitting in the press, you know, pin unable to react.

To any of it.

And then you know, but certainly there were moments in my career where it's impossible not to feel the gravity of the moment. Like in two thousand and eight, I'm with Obama when the results are coming in, we ride over to the in the motorcade to Grant Park. I'm like behind backstage when he's giving his acceptance speech to become the first black president. It's like, you have this is really the objectivity debate. It's like are you human? Like are you getting the chills in this moment? Because

Yeah.

I've always thought of journalists, particularly print journalists, as like first draft historians, and so to be witnessing all that, I don't know, it just it seems like an incredible experience.

You must have.

It is you're like so exhausted, and there's like so much whining. You know, it's like, what am we gotta be fed? I need my marriout points, So like there's all this whiny, Like there's tea. You're so exhausting, I've and slept in days. Your editors are asking you for like fifteen different stories and can you have a feed? And I need some color and you can get some voter voices, and it's like you really have to stop and be like this is fucking cool, Like this is amazing, this is a privilege.

We'll be right back.

Stay with us. We're back. I'm here with Amy Chosick. You covered Hillary's twenty sixteen campaign, and you've seen several women enter presidential races since then. We now even have a female vice president. How do you think we as a group look at women in power right now in twenty twenty four?

Has it changed?

Sadly, I don't think it's changed that much.

And it's really interesting because we started writing this show, you know a few years ago, and we kept kind of adjusting it as the world change. And the one big thing that would have like drastically impacted the show is well, we have a woman president. You know, it's like, Nope, that doesn't look like it's going to happen. We're fine,

Right, So I think I think.

That is that has been something that's different and evolved and positive. Right, We've seen multiple women on the campaigns, on the debate stage. I remember when Hillary was running and it was like twenty fifteen and people were talking about, well, is Elizabeth Warrengan a run, and well, there can't be two women on the stage and it's going to be a catfight.

You know.

There was just like nobody could even perceive of how two women would debate each other. So like, even seeing multiple women on the debate stage in twenty twenty, I think was really positive. I mean, one of the things our show does is like is I think it's one of the first shows to imagine female candidates that very much aren't in the Hillary template. Right. And of course there's themes that I learned from from covering Hillary that

Say, the aesthetic, right, because she had the hair and the pants suit and it became so such a thing for women.

Yeah, So there are things like that that we just couldn't We can't even envision a woman in power who's like not dressed like that, and that is essentially that pants suit look was essentially trying to emulate a man.

Right.

So I think we've evolved a little, but sadly not as much as I'd hoped.

There's this scene where Felicity like burns her brae, which to.

Me felt like the only moment where I was like, this would never happen.

Yeah, But to that point, do you feel like writing in these fictional characters, women running for president or in any sort of power position that are doing things that seem unbelievable. Now are moving then the narrative forward for actual candidates to sort of start to step into things that we haven't seen before.

I hope.

So. I mean, I think at its best, TV can influence culture. BRA burning actually comes from a real situation. In two thousand and eight, I was with Hillary New Hampshire and she was doing a rally and all these guys stood up and started chanting, iron my shirt, Iron my shirt. I guess it's like this sexist chant and and she just kind of kept pressing, you know, she just pressed on with her pole. She just ignored them and pressed on. And so in my head, I was like,

You know, they call it the bra bump. She gets a bump of the poles.

You know what happens when you actually respond the way you know you wish you could, that you never really could. And then the other thing is, like, you know, the Joanna Gleeson plays Caroline Bennett the front Runner and the Pilot, and then she flames out, And what I love about her is that she flames out in her own sex scambal, not her husband's sex scamble. You know.

So I agree that, Like, so j wait, like this threesome cult thing, like it's.

Totally random, but like it was just fun to envision of like a boomer woman flaming out because of her own sex scandal.

We deserve sex scandals too.

So for anyone listening who doesn't realize this, the fact that Amy made the move from reporting to screenwriting as a career jump is really remarkable because so many journalists dream of doing that. So I want to talk about that pivot for a moment. How did that pivot test you?

Oh?

God, it definitely did. I mean, I feel like this has been well for.

One I don't want to I don't want to give.

You too long of a response. But I was always felt like a creative writer. I studied poetry in college. I like moved to New York no job, no apartment. I had a stack of clips in the daily text and thinking I could be a journalist, but like, how am I going to support myself as a poet. I didn't have trust fund, you know, no one paying my rent. So I you know, I got a job, as I

I did that for a really long time.

But when I wrote my book and I got to kind of write my own voice versus newspaper voice, it just reminded me that, like, I really want to be a creative writer. So in a way, transitioning to screenwriting felt like my soul had come alive. Like I could be like creative again. I could play with my imaginary friends. So I say, but yeah, it was like it was a real endurance. It's like an endurance sport. I mean, this has taken five years and three networks, you know.

Was it worth it?

It was?

It was worth it. Yes, it was worth it to put this. I'm really proud of what we put out in the world. I mean, to your point we were talking earlier, is like that we got to envision this world as we as we wish it would be.

Yeah, I think it was. I think it was worth it.

I moved my whole I relocated my whole family to Los Angeles.

My husband's Irish.

He still thinks it's relentlessly sunny here big swings.

To move your whole family's.

Bag, Yeah, I feel like you have to go like all in, you know. But it was hard.

It was hard to leave the New York Times too, and my whole kind of identity was wrapped up in being a Times reporter.

Yeah. Have you found a new placeholder for that identity, like a new title or are you good with sort of the undefined role?

It's interesting.

I feel like here I just live much more of a writer's life, you know, I don't necessarily need to be like define in a way. I felt like I did there, maybe because New York is just New York, or or because you're always going into rooms and be like I'm with the New York Times, you know, and I feel like here, I just like really enjoy, you know, playing with my imaginary friends and moving words on the page.

And Amy, Yeah, this must be so liberating for you as a creative to be able to live in this playground. I mean, coming from the newspaper world, from journalism where you're held to such tight and high standards, You're free now.

Yeah.

It was.

There were definitely scenes that were really cathartic. There's a scene at the end when Sadie has a conversation with Felicity Walker that is like a conversation that I've had in my head for eight years. I have to say I was really a peak life experience to be able to turn something that was painful into art. And I know it's make a TV, but I'm still gonna call it art man, And that was really cathartic. It was, Amy, Thank you so much, so fun to talk to you, and I'm so thrilled of you.

Like the show.

We love it heay.

Amy Chosick is a journalist, screenwriter, and creator of the new TV series The Girls on the Bus. It's streaming now on Max, so catch the season finale on May nine.

I promise you you won't regret it.

Hopefully the listeners can feel the energy in the room because it was really electric.

Well, it's so fun to sit with another journalist, right, Like, we get into the x's and o's and shared experiences and differences.

It's fun.

But I could tell that you are really interested in people's transitions. And I like that question you asked her at the end about was it all worth it?

Totally?

And I gained a lot from hearing Amy talk about hers I love that she did say, yes, this pivot was worth it. In the end, you can tell that she just has this renewed purpose now that she's on this different career path. She said that her soul really came alive becoming a screenwriter and transitioning out of journalism. And also what she's doing is really powerful. She is creating the world that she wants to see through her art. Mm hmmm, that's it for today's show, Folks. Tomorrow, comedian

Plus, we're asking for a friend that's right. We want to know your questions. Do you have a friendship situation you need a little extra guidance with Send us a voice note to Hello at the brightsidepodcast dot com and one of our bright Side busties is gonna help you out.

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I'm Danielle Robe at Danielle Robe on Instagram and TikTok.

That's ro Bay.

We'll see you back here tomorrow. Keep looking on the bright side.